That"s when I saw it across the field on the outskirts of the woods: an old-fashioned wishing-type well, where I knew that wishes were useless. "Are you going to throw me in there, too?" I asked, the past becoming clearer when I noticed his tigereye ring.
Lolique had been right. I was a duped dope.
She chuckled. "Don"t look at me. I didn"t throw Isobel in there. She died before I was born."
"But you"re the woman who was seen sneaking in and out of the playhouse, aren"t you?"
Lolique scoffed. "No, that was my mother, before the locals caught on to her presence and she accepted the role they handed her as Sampson"s sister. She"d moved in with him, again."
"Without bothering to break off her affair with me," Goodwin said.
"Poor you," I said, tongue-in-cheek to Gary. "And what about you, Natalie? Why?"
"True, I hated Isobel," Natalie said. "Daddy"s little girl, keeping watch, so no one could get close to him."
I"d taken sewing lessons from this woman! "You had a thing for Isobel"s father?"
"What if I did? I didn"t kill anyone."
Goodwin chuckled. "Natalie would have helped if she could have cozied up to the old man, but she didn"t know what I planned. She"s been my most loyal helper."
"Thanks loads, Dad," Lolique snapped.
"Natalie"s not as loyal as you think," I told Goodwin. "She"s a gossip. Told me the first day about your accident, about how badly you wanted the dealership. She"s not loyal at all."
Goodwin whipped around to look at Natalie, now looking daggers at me. If only I could make the three of them duke it out and forget about me.
"And your daughter, Mr. Goodwin. You must be so proud."
"My stepdaughter," he said.
"Thanks again. Okay, so Sampson was my biological father. Rich as G.o.d. And my stupid-a.s.s stepbrother goes and kills him before he can change his will in my favor. He paid, though. Keep pushing, Natalie."
"So that"s why you killed Vinney, Lolique? Revenge?"
"What an amazing hypothesis," she said.
"Not a hypothesis. Vinney ratted you out. He called Eve and gave you up with his last breath." I was lying of course, but she didn"t know that. "And as for Sampson"s money, you may still get it, now that the truth about his divorce to your mother is out. I"m sure there"ll be something left after the IRS takes their share. Years" worth of back taxes, I hear."
She stopped walking and stood still as a snake about to strike. I so wish she"d point that gun in another direction.
I had to break her, though. "You see, your father was selling his corner lot because he had to. You and your mother climbed out from beneath your respective rocks to finesse a man headed to prison for tax evasion."
Lolique gave a feral hiss through her teeth, and I felt fear and fury radiating off her in waves, small consolation since we were getting closer to the well, too close. "You killed Vinney for nothing, except, hey, maybe you"ll inherit your father"s debt, anyway?"
"Vinney was a son of a b.i.t.c.h. He was supposed to pin that second fire, the one we planned, on my husband by planting his sweater with the bones. Does he do that? No. He kills my father to start an unplanned fire, sic the law on us, and ruin my chances to inherit Sampson"s and McDowell"s fortunes. Two fortunes! Vinney deserved to die."
"So you killed him."
She raised her head with pride. "So I killed him."
"Vinney was a good son," Goodwin said almost to himself, and I understood suddenly his stay on the psych ward, as if he lived in a different world than the rest of us. He looked up at me, but I"m not sure he saw me. "Vinney took the bones out of your building for me."
I remembered Dante"s story of the night the bones were brought to my building . . . Goodwin brought them. Dante taunted him, and he left so shaken he had a car accident, and ended up in a wheel chair in a psych ward. Puzzle pieces were falling into place like clockwork toys, click, click, click.
Goodwin"s face changed and he radiated hate. "Why the h.e.l.l did you go and buy that old shack?"
My heart beat like a drum, and my hands were so sweaty it was getting hard to keep a grasp on my bag.
My connection to Isobel grew strong, and her fate fell into place. "You put Isobel here when this was an empty lot, didn"t you? Before construction here was a glimmer in Zachary Goodwin"s eye."
"I should have put her husband here with her," Goodwin said. "While I was dropping her here, McDowell was having drinks with her father, outlining the brilliance of building a second dealership on this very piece of land. I"d thought it was smart to put her on land that her old man owned. But the old man and McDowell, they planned to build here in secret. Kept projected ledgers. No one knew. Not even Isobel. She told me that she thought her husband was embezzling."
Click. Another puzzle piece fell into place.
The closer we got to the well, the harder my heart pumped, the more slippery my hands became. I could barely keep a grasp on my bag. But if I moved it, everyone would know how heavy it was.
I wanted to use it, but I had three targets. One with a gun.
I"d keep Goodwin talking and wait for my best shot, because the more he talked, the slower we walked.
Werner should be at the dealership by now. Would he look for me?
"Why did you kill Isobel, Mr. Goodwin?"
"For the dealership, dammit. I"m blood. Her father said it would be mine when he died."
"Why isn"t it yours, then?"
Five feet from the well.
"McDowell became his right hand, his expansion idea put him in favor, and his grief at Isobel"s loss appeared to match her father"s. Then, when Isobel goes missing, the old man has a stroke, and who takes him in? McDowell."
Serves you right, I wanted to say. Had McDowell been sincere, at least about Isobel? I wondered way too late.
"Why did you move Isobel"s bones in the first place?" I asked him. "Why not leave her in the well?"
"This was about to become a car lot. I couldn"t hide a body this close to a construction crew, then the public."
"Why did you bring them to my building, then?" I was stalling but he hadn"t figured that out yet. I was surprised that he couldn"t smell my fear.
"It was a morgue," he shouted, "full of body drawers. I didn"t think I"d live to see the place fall down. You messed with me by buying it. I"ve killed once, I can kill again." Hate laced his last words.
An icy fear ran down my spine.
"Why did you keep the quilt until you moved Isobel from the well to my place?"
"She made the quilt from my aunt"s clothes and my aunt was good to me."
"But you killed her daughter."
"So now they"re together." He raised a hand like he"d done them a favor. Psycho.
"The night I brought Isobel to your place-" He shook his head. "I had the accident that put me in this chair."
"I know," I said. "That"s called karma."
He tried to backhand me, but I stepped from his reach. "Do you want me to sic my ghost friend on you again?" I asked. "Too bad I can"t get him to trip you down the stairs in your chair this time."
Goodwin roared like a wounded bear. It would be to my advantage if he lost it altogether. He might be less careful, though his two bodyguards looked on with quiet amus.e.m.e.nt. They wouldn"t let me get away with anything.
"Lolique, why did you call Isobel "Saint Belle" the night we had drinks?"
"The old goat worshipped her, and he was guilt ridden because they"d quarreled the day she went missing. He still calls her name in his sleep, the schlub."
Isobel and McDowell had been having a simple quarrel in my cape-wearing vision. I"d called that one wrong.
Two feet from the well.
I did some fancy footwork around the chair to confuse them all, back to front, a not-so-happy dance.
Lolique homed in with her gun, but she was so focused on me, she tripped over a clump of gra.s.s, and fell.
I ducked behind Natalie as the gun went off.
Natalie fell. Had she caught the bullet?
Lolique scrambled around in the gra.s.s. She must have dropped the gun.
While she looked, I slipped my hand in my pocket and pushed the single-digit speed dial for Werner, covering the sound by shoving Gary"s chair into the stone base of the well.
He screamed in pain as Lolique scrabbled to her feet.
As she came our way, her attention on Goodwin screaming, I swung my bag and knocked her down. But the bag was so heavy, it flew from my slippery hands and landed in the well.
Lolique rose and came straight for me, and I realized how strong hate and greed could be.
"Where"s the gun?" Goodwin yelled. "Kill her now!"
"You"re stupid, Goodwin," I yelled, ducking Lolique"s clawing charge. "The police are taking down Isobel"s portrait right now. You were home free."
"No!" Gary howled like a madman and caught my attention.
Lolique caught me off guard and tackled me. I ended up balanced on the edge of the well, like I"d seesawed on the edge of the upper-floor railing to see the portrait.
Lolique laughed in my face and shoved me backward with both hands.
Like Isobel, I was falling.
Forty-three.
It is the unseen, unforgettable, ultimate accessory of fashion that heralds your arrival and prolongs your departure.
-COCO CHANEL I smelled chocolate.
The light was bright, the tunnel narrow, and on the other side, someone called my name.
I opened my eyes. "Who knew that G.o.d would look like the Wiener."
G.o.d growled, and then he got touchy-feely and ran his hands over my arms and legs, my head and back. "Anything broken?" he asked.
"Everything." It didn"t smell like chocolate anymore. It smelled musty and damp. It smelled of decay. The dirt around me had bugs in it, lots of them, and . . . bones. Small bones.
"Can I just say that you took ten years off my life? By rights, you should be dead," Werner said, and I could feel his hand trembling against my arm. "Smart of you to throw down a bean bag chair first."
"I landed on my bag?"
"Well, it"s not a purple marshmallow."
"You bet it"s not. My bruises are probably shaped like eggs." I gasped, remembering. "I hope you didn"t take down the portrait."
Werner chuckled. "We"re having a conversation in the bottom of a well, Madeira."
"So . . . you"re not G.o.d?"
"I"m not a wiener, either."
"Did I say that out loud?"
"You"ve probably got a concussion. It doesn"t count. McDowell was more concerned about you being out here with Goodwin than about my plan to take down the portrait."
"Goodwin killed Isobel and threw her down here," I said, "not McDowell. Vinney was abetting his handicapped stepfather, the murderer, by removing the evidence of Goodwin"s crime from my building."
"I know. And Vinney killed Sampson to set the fire as a diversion, like you said. Goodwin and Lolique are up there confessing."
"Singing like canaries?"
"You watch too many old cop shoes, Mad."
"Enough to know that these small bones might belong to Isobel. Goodwin was sloppy when he moved the bones out of here." I hurt when I moved but I picked up the ones I could reach and slipped them into Werner"s shirt pocket. "Take good care of Isobel."
"Leave it to you to keep trying to solve a crime when everything seems hopeless."